A single amino acid substitution confers high cinchonidine oxidation activity comparable with that of rabbit to monkey aldehyde oxidase 1.

Aldehyde oxidase 1 (AOX1) is a major member of the xanthine oxidase family belonging to the class of complex molybdo-flavoenzymes and plays an important role in the nucleophilic oxidation of N-heterocyclic aromatic compounds and various aldehydes. The enzyme has been well known to show remarkable species differences. Comparing the rabbit and monkey enzymes, the former showed extremely high activity toward cinchonidine and methotrexate, but the latter exhibited only marginal activities.

Effects of selenium deficiency on aldehyde oxidase 1 in rats.

Selenium deficiency has been reported to result in an extraordinary decrease of glutathione peroxidase (GSH-Px) and, reversely, an increase of detoxifying enzymes such as glutathione-S-transferase (GST), uridine-5'-diphosphate glucuronosyltransferase (UGT), nicotinamide-dependent quinine oxidoreductase (NQO1; DT-diaphorase), and epoxide hydrolase without significantly affecting cytochrome P450 activity. However, little is known about the effects on aldehyde oxidase 1 (AOX1) activity towards various kinds of aldehydes and N-heterocyclic aromatic compounds. The aim of this study is to clarify the effects of selenium deficiency on AOX1 in rats.

Functional analysis of aldehyde oxidase using expressed chimeric enzyme between monkey and rat.

Aldehyde oxidase (AO) is a homodimer with a subunit molecular mass of approximately 150 kDa. Each subunit consists of about 20 kDa 2Fe-2S cluster domain storing reducing equivalents, about 40 kDa flavine adenine dinucleotide (FAD) domain and about 85 kDa molybdenum cofactor (MoCo) domain containing a substrate binding site. In order to clarify the properties of each domain, especially substrate binding domain, chimeric cDNAs were constructed by mutual exchange of 2Fe-2S/FAD and MoCo domains between monkey and rat.